water changes

[rytis]

it's said to let the water age. then its said water changes at least once a week. no problem. but question arises how much does it depend on how crowded the tank is: for example if i age my water with no fish in it for 1 month will it go bad in a few days?

i got a 265 galon tank and in it 9 discus notfuly grown and 2 plecos that is it. do 1/4 water changes 1/week. tank is also full of live plants.

so i should be totaly ok or what? and question is what if i only had one small discus in that tank and nothing else and would leave it for 2 months without water changes, would it be ok?

[sammigold]

I cant help with the water aging question... but with regard to w/c... it does partly hinge on the amount of fish you have... ie. more fish, more waste/ammonia which then turns in to nitrites which can be toxic to fish... I have never left one fish alone in a tank for 2 months without a water change so I can't say whether or not you could but I dont think it would be a good idea as that 1 fish will still have waste and would probably not always eat all the food you would feed it so you would still get a waste build up just on a smaller scale (ie you may not have to change the water every week maybe every two weeks)

I have 4 discus not fully grown, 2 small clown loaches, 2 tiny bristlenoses, 13 cardinals, 3 rummy nose, and 4 black widow tetras and 1 angel and we currently change our water 25% once a week....and that works... for the time being.

Just keep an eye on your fish, if once a week is working then thats fine but if you find that your fish are displaying symptoms of stress or not looking very happy you may want to do water changes twice a week or more. Its whatever keeps your fish healthy and happy ... and clean water conditions are very important. You may find as your fish get bigger that you will need to do more frequent w/c as the bigger they are the more waste they make. HTH

[blackwater spa]

I think when most people say "water ageing", they mean the process by which we remove harmful substances like chlorine or chloramine from the water.

Town water used to be treated with chlorine to kill any bacteria harmful to humans. When fish keepers only had chlorine in the tap water to worry about, the simplest way to get rid of the chlorine was to let the water stand for a few days in order to let the chlorine escape as a gas from the water (maybe with an air-pump to improve aeration). This is how the term, "water ageing", came into usage.

Nowadays, however, most town water is not treated simply with chlorine. Most town water supply nowadays is treated with chloramine, a nastier compound of chlorine and ammonia. Chloramine is much more stable in the water and not so easily got rid of compared to chlorine. You must use a chloramine remover (bought from the aquarium shop) to break down the chloramine into chlorine and ammonia (both toxic to fish) and THEN aerate the water to get rid of both the chlorine and ammonia. Simply letting the water stand will not break down the chloramine.

Once the tap water has been properly treated with chloramine remover and then aerated to remove the resultant chlorine and ammonia, it gains no additional benefit from any further "ageing". In fact, letting the treated water stay stagnant can be harmful in that any harmful bacteria in it may then multiply unchecked.

Once the treated water has been added to the aquarium, it will start being polluted by the fish waste, uneaten food, etc. How long the water had been treated beforehand has very little relevance on how long it will take to become polluted enough to warrant a water change.